THE MONTHLY BULLETIN. 



283 



surface and red streaks in (he flesh. In many varieties (he normal fruit has many 

 minute red dots on the skin, but iu the yellows fruit (he spots are generally about 

 one or two millimeters iu diameter. The internal streaks run through all the flesh 

 and not simply near the stone as in the partly red-fleshed varieties. In full red- 

 fleshed kinds the spots are not distinguishable. 



The premature fruits are the best character ami. in fact, "prematures" is often 

 used as the name of the trouble by many growers, and is indeed a better name than 

 "yellows." which has unfortunately become the established name in literature, as 

 there are many other causes of yellow foliage in peach, and often trees with this 

 disease do not have yellow leaves for some time after they have the disease and have 

 become a menace to the orchard. The fruit on disease.! trees ripens from a few days 

 to several weeks before the healthy tries of the same variety or before the unaffected 

 branches of the same tree, for the disease usually shows on parts of a tree some 

 months or a year before the rest of the tree; but experimental attempts at cutting 

 out such diseased branches show that the disease has already established itself in 

 the apparently healthy parts of the tree as much as a year before it shows its 

 symptoms. Teaches may premature from the effects of borers or other partial gird- 

 ling, and perhaps other causes, hut in such cases do not show the characteristic spots 

 on the surface. 



In; SS The entire interior of the peach is affected by the disease. The 

 left-hand peach is cut through the center showing the red lines in the flesh 

 and spots around the pit. The right-hand peach is sectioned through the flesh 

 showing the lines of red in cross-section. (U. S. Dept. of Agriculture.) 



The next symptom to appear is the premature development of the leaf buds, which 

 under normal conditions would remain dormant till the next spring. These generally 

 show as slender weak shoots with narrow, yellowish leaves. In young trees or those 

 not in fruit this is the only character that can be used for diagnosing the trouble, 

 and is not perfectly reliable, as such shoots may result from other causes. The 

 yellows shoots have been but rarely found on nursery stock and, as a rule, the disease 

 does not show itself before the third year, and the most common time is after two 

 or three years of bearing. The diseased tree does not seem to be able to produce 

 dormant buds, but the axillary buds keep using up the reserve and developing their 

 sickly growth until sometimes we will have several sets of slender branches where 

 normally there would be a dormant bud only. 



The next year there is generally little or no fruit and the upper branches begin to 

 die. while more and more of the clustered, small-leaved shoots come out on the trunk 

 and larger limbs. The leaves are oflen red and tend to roll at the edges, and the 

 whole tree has a decidedly worthless appearance. Death takes place in three or four 

 years, or before, if the trees are under unfavorable conditions, as the diseased trees 

 are more subject to winter injury than healdiy ones. Nitrogenous fertilizers may 

 invigorate the yellows trees and carry them along for a year or so longer, but can 

 not cure them and they simply remain a menace to their fellows, the symptoms of 

 the disease soon reappear, and the tree dies. 



